


The Time Is Then

by unadrift



Category: Doctor Who, Torchwood
Genre: Episode Related, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2009-09-21
Updated: 2009-09-21
Packaged: 2017-10-02 12:09:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,036
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6155
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unadrift/pseuds/unadrift
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"You know, I used to wonder about this: if I got the chance, would I just punch you in the face, or would I be able to stop myself long enough to demand an explanation?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Time Is Then

**Author's Note:**

> Post _Children of Earth_. Not cheerful, not fixing anything.

Personally, Jack had always hated Rigel 6.

Well, not when it had been just a giant ocean around a huge swamp, populated by nothing more than small mammals and big reptiles and huge fish. He'd been pretty much indifferent about it then.

But once the first businessman had set foot on the planet, it had taken only a couple of centuries for it to develop into a 'blossoming community of free trade and cultural exchange'. Translation: Rigel 6 was where smugglers, petty thieves, fences, and whoever had law enforcement hot on their heels went to let their hair down and/or do some business.

There were aliens of all shapes, genders and sexual orientations frequenting the planet, which still consisted mainly of swamp, with just the one space port sitting smack in the middle of the one big city, smack in the middle of the one big continent.

The thing was: it should have been Jack's kind of place. Lots of interesting people to meet, lots of business opportunities to seize, no weird hang-ups to worry about. In theory, he could chat up anyone in this bar and take to bed whomever he wanted, and no one would raise an eyebrow – or move an equivalent part of their anatomy in a way that expressed the same sentiment.

Except for that one time (thousands of Jack's years ago, back when he still could have died). The Colonel's daughter hit on him, and pretty spectacularly, too. Jack's cruiser was almost shot down when he beat a strategic retreat after that night of intense and boundless passion. Come to think of it, the girl's spouse might have joined them at some point. Jack was a little fuzzy about the details.

The trigger-happy, over-protective, ruthless Colonel had been the head honcho around here-- No, he _would be_ the head honcho around here in another 95 years. He wasn't even born yet. _He wasn't even born yet._

Oftentimes these days, Jack wished for an anchor, something that would ground him in the here and the now. And then he wished for that pathetic wish to go away. His time traveling days were long over, and now he suddenly started feeling adrift?

He gestured for another drink.

The barkeeper blinked at him with his middle eye. "You wanna drink yourself to death?"

"I certainly like the idea," Jack answered, voice slurring.

"That ain't the way," the barkeeper told him, polishing a glass with a dirty dish towel.

"You realize that your having food on the table depends directly on my drinking alcohol in large amounts?" Jack said and added as an afterthought, "And paying for it?"

The barkeeper shrugged. "This ain't my joint."

"But it's your _job_," Jack said, pointing an unsteady finger. "And your job is to get me another Starburst. Make it double."

The barkeeper blinked with all three eyes at once, possibly in resignation, and did as instructed.

"And get me a hot chocolate, will you?" a familiar voice said.

Apparently the barkeeper wasn't a stranger to anything, not even to serving hot beverages just before dawn. "Sure thing."

Slowly, Jack turned to the left. "You," he said. If he weren't so drunk, and so damn _tired_, the Doctor would already be sporting a shiner, or worse.

"Me," the Doctor confirmed. He sounded almost cheerful. But then again, he sounded almost cheerful when he was about to die a horrible and painful death. Which he was pretty damn close to right now, actually.

"What are you doing here?" Jack asked, doing his best to sound uninterested.

"I was in the neighborhood. Thought I'd stop by." The Doctor made himself comfortable on the barstool next to Jack's, looking like he didn't have a care in the world – or, in his case, in the universe.

"Because this is such a nice place to spend a couple of days in," Jack said.

"Exactly. What's not to like?" The Doctor's expression was open and impossibly innocent, not giving a hint as to what his hidden agenda might have been. When it came to the Doctor, there was _always_ a hidden agenda. That was the nature of being a Timelord and self-righteous bastard, Jack guessed.

"I have to give it to you, you've got some nerve," Jack said into his empty shotglass.

Wisely – or stupidly, Jack couldn't tell yet – the Doctor didn't answer.

"You know," Jack said conversationally, "I used to wonder about this: if I got the chance, would I just punch you in the face, or would I be able to stop myself long enough to demand an explanation?" A humorless laugh escaped him. "Turns out neither option holds any appeal. I don't want to hear excuses. I don't want to hear your justifications. And I'm sick to death of fighting. I just want you to leave. Shouldn't be difficult for you. You've had lots of practice."

The barkeeper served another shotglass to Jack and a steaming mug to the Doctor, then quickly made himself scarce again, eyes darting between them nervously.

The Doctor blew on his hot chocolate and said, reasonably, "It wasn't in my power to stop the 4-5-6."

Strangely, Jack wasn't prepared to hear this, even though it had constantly been occupying his mind for the last few months; what he could have done differently, what _anyone_ could have done differently to stop the catastrophic chain of events. Every angle, every step; he had gone through them, analyzed them all, had heard the numbers four, five, six in his head so often that the mention of them shouldn't lead to bile rising in his throat anymore.

"Somehow I knew you'd say that," he gritted out and downed the shot. It burned, but not nearly enough.

"It's the truth," the Doctor said simply. "Fact."

There was only one thing Jack could think of that could prevent the Doctor from going wherever he wanted to go. "Are you trying to tell me there's a time-lock on Earth?"

"On that particular week, there is. Yes."

As excuses went, this one was lame, Jack thought.

"We had our reasons," the Doctor added, which wasn't really helping to sell the lie, but it made Jack uneasy. _If_ the Doctor was telling the truth-- That would certainly complicate things.

"And those were?"

"Oh, a great many beautiful things. Take hot chocolate, for example. And the exciting ExSol expedition from 2364. The three trillion citizens of the Great And Bountiful Empire. Cold fusion generators. The cure for the Mincharian Black Death," the Doctor answered, and took a sip from his mug. "Oh, and I always found the Great Wall of China very impressive."

Jack tightened his fingers around the empty glass. "And this answers my question-- how?"

The Doctor put down the mug and turned to face him. He had that determined gleam in his eye that always made him look half stern and half crazy. "Earth's contact with the 4-5-6 is a critical junction in spacetime. The interconnected events of that week, every decision that was made, are in a very fragile balance. If that balance is disturbed, the inevitable result will be the complete destruction of the planet and the enslavement of mankind. Good intentions won't be enough to keep disaster from happening. No Great Bountiful Empire, no more Great Wall of China," he said.

It made Jack remember the one thing he had always hated – yes, _hated_ – about the Doctor: no living being, not even a Timelord, would ever know everything about everything. Jack himself could live a literal million years – he tried not to shudder at the thought – but he knew with certainty that he would only ever learn a fraction of everything there was to know. It seemed that the universe had never sent the Doctor that memo. "How _the hell_ do you know? You can't have tracked all possible--"

"Jack," the Doctor cut him off. "It happened before. It took decades to fix. In fact," he said and threw Jack a look, "I'm still working on it."

Oh, Jack thought. Damn. That could only mean--

"Let it go, Jack."

"No," he said, shaking his head so vehemently it made him dizzy. "I can't." He'd been pondering the idea during the months he'd spent on Earth, after, and he'd started planning and gathering information a few weeks ago. So he didn't like this bug-infested planet, but it had all the right contacts if you were looking for obscure things, like technical equipment that had been washed in by accident from the 25th century. Or any other century beyond the 24th, when the first timeline mapper was built. He wasn't picky.

Apart from building time-traveling machinery almost from scratch, there was one other thing left to do: Jack needed to figure out when exactly it had all gone to hell; what he could have done (what he could do) to change the outcome; the right move at the right time that would have made (that would make) it all turn out okay.

"You don't want to stop it from happening. You know that you can't," the Doctor said, matter-of-factly. "You want to stop _certain people_ from dying. Think about what you're doing, Jack. You're risking billions of lives and the future of an entire planet."

"You can't be sure of that! There's always the possibility that I might--"

"No!" The Doctor slammed his hand down on the bar so hard that Jack actually flinched. "This is why I disabled your wristband. This is why you're _dangerous_. You can't, Jack. I won't let you. The time-lock will prevent it."

At that point, Jack realized. It had taken him while. He laughed, and it had a bitter taste to it. "Oh, really? If that was true, would you even be here, talking to me? I'm thinking no. I'm also thinking that everyone who tried to break a time-lock before was probably capable of dying."

The Doctor regarded him silently for a moment. Then he said, "Remember Dalek Kahn."

"Oh, I remember him. Vividly. He's a hard Dalek to forget, what with the stark raving insanity."

"You want that for yourself?"

Jack wondered-- Could he even be damaged that way? The line of thought led to an interesting possibility. "This could be the thing that finally kills me," Jack said, more to himself than the Doctor. Whatever it was that Rose had done to him, it had started with the heart of the Tardis, time and relative dimension in space, and maybe that was where it would end, too; with Jack bending time and space in all the wrong ways, breaking what should never have been mended in the first place. It was more than a little scary how appealing the thought was to him.

However Jack looked at it, there really was nothing to lose.

"Well, it's been great meeting you again, Doctor." He threw a few coins of the local currency on the bar. "But I've got things to do. Please refrain from stopping by in the future."

"Jack," the Doctor said.

"Goodbye."

* * *

The Doctor watched Jack leave, slamming the door behind him so hard it rattled on its hinges. The Doctor didn't need to check with the Tardis to know that this conversation had been as unsuccessful as the ones before.

It was no reason to worry. Yet. He had lots of time (in an abstract, non-linear sense). Although, it wouldn't be getting any easier. The further he went back in time, the more hostile Jack's response would become, if previous experiences were any indication.

They'd had this conversation three times before. Or rather, viewed from the moment in which he and Jack were currently existing, they would be having these conversations in the future.

It wasn't the Doctor's idea of a great plan to keep going further and further backwards in time after each failed attempt. But time was a delicate thing; unforgiving, and with its own rules.

The barkeeper came over to collect the money from the bar and to pick up the empty glass. "Messed up, that one," he commented, nodding wisely. "Better be careful."

As if the Doctor didn't already know that.

* * *

"What are _you_ doing here?"

"Oh, I was in the neighborhood. I thought I'd-- stop by."

* * *


End file.
